| Len
Len
coaches executives and educators. Currently he is coaching
school and non-profit executives in Massachusetts, Vermont,
and Connecticut. He helps people identify what their real
goals are, encourages them to attempt to achieve those goals,
and stays with them, helping them to solve the problems they
have in achieving those goals. Trained by The Coach's Training
Institute, Len is an experienced school superintendent accustomed
to helping educators of all types.
Len
was superintendent of the Erving School Union #28 school district
in the western part of Massachusetts for twenty-five years.
Union #28 is a small, but complex district composed of five
towns, four schools, four school committees, five select boards,
and five finance committee.
During
his tenure, he and the school district negotiated successfully
the introduction of the nation's first special education reform
law, the recessions of the mid-1970's and the end of the 80's
and beginning of the 90's, Massachusetts' 4% tax limit and
its Proposition 2 1/2 levy limit, and the education reforms
of the mid-1980's and the 1990's. During his tenure, the district
became a leader in the use of technology for instruction,
in thematic instruction and authentic assessment, in the inclusion
of special needs children, and in early care and education.
The district was particularly successful in obtaining state
grant funds and in maintaining positive labor relations.
After
leaving School Union #28 Len was associated with the Northeast
Foundation for Children (NEFC), where he was Executive Director
. NEFC is a national educational reform organization devoted
to The Responsive Classroom approach. During his tenure there,
the consulting division of that organization was reorganized
and made more profitable and the Greenfield Center School,
the organization's laboratory school, was revitalized. Prior
to coming to Union #28, Len was Assistant to the Superintendent
of the Lewiston-Porter District in Western New York.
He
completed an administrative internship in the Chicago Public
Schools while attending The University of Children, taught
in Carlisle and Newton, Massachusetts, and served as Editor
of the Administrator's Notebook. He has completed degrees
from Brandeis University, Oberlin College, and the University
of Massachusetts - Amherst.
What
Len is Up to This Summer
Christine
An
outstanding teacher, Christine has been successful in urban,
suburban, and rural environments. Her career has been evenly
divided among time as a teacher, time as a school principal
and assistant principal, and time working on state and national
policy issues. Her teaching was in suburban Connecticut where
she learned, among other things, what is possible in education
when resources are abundant.
As
a school administrator, she learned how to make successful
schools with scarce resources. She was assistant principal
in Chicago's Disney Magnet School and principal of the Swift
River School in Western Massachusetts. She was able to think
about policy issues broadly while working as a Research Analyst
at the Donahue Institute at the University of Massachusetts
-- Amherst and a Research Associate at the Educational Development
Center, and in her work with the joint education committee
of the Massachusetts legislature.
During
her tenure as a principal in Massachusetts, she obtained several
competitive grants. Under her leadership, the Swift River
School was awarded grants supporting innovative science curriculum,
after school programs, and early care and education. Christine
brought her school through the complexities of Massachusetts
education reform and managed some difficult and unusual personnel
and collective bargaining issues. Her successes in Massachusetts
mirrored her success in Chicago where she helped to bring
order and stability to a school serving a population that
drew on the entire city of Chicago.
In
addition to successfully writing and managing grants, Christine
has helped school districts assess the effectiveness of grants
and she has helped independent groups draft charter school
proposals. She received a B.A. from Mount Holyoke College
and a M.Ed. from the Harvard Graduate School of Education
in Administration, Planning and Social Policy.
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